After non-stop rain last year I never thought I would be glad to see the rain come back, but after the cold, cold spring and dry weather it's a real relief to see the temperature rise and some rain come to the garden. Everything in the garden is in stasis waiting for the weather to warm up. The only things really growing are the alliums ( garlic, wild garlic and Babbington's leeks) and the rhubarb.

Rhubarb April Fool (01 Apr 2013)

The wild garlic is lovely to watch growing and spreading in the garden. It was planted a few years ago and has self-seeded really nicely. The younger plants are much smaller, but are starting to cover a reasonable area and make a great ground cover in the shady spot they are growing in. The oldest clump was large enough to give a crop of a 100g which, combined with some Babbington's leeks, made some very tasty pesto.

Several generations of wild garlic growing up close to their parents (01 Apr 2013)

In anticipation of warmer weather I'm growing some seeds for salad this year. I don't normally bother much with annual plants, but I got a copy of Charles Dowding's book Salad Leaves for All Seasons which has inspired me. It has a scheme for growing two trays of forty modules at a time for salad for six months. In the past I've failed spectacularly with seeds, but this year, with the help of a propagator, most of them have sprouted already. Hopefully I can keep them alive long enough to transplant them outside when it gets warmer.

April was a washout. The wettest month in a long time. After the dry start to the year the garden started to thrive with all the water. I have to be honest though, it also kept me out of the garden for a while. When I did venture out it was mostly to grab some rocket leaves. The mild winter meant that the two rows of rocket that I had at the end of the year in one of the raised beds just started growing again as the winter passed. There was enough to make some rocket pesto which was delicious and peppery.

There are two rhubarb plants in the garden and I force each one on alternate years. Last year I used an upturned plastic tub, but it was not quite big enough. This year I tried an old garden incinerator with the bottom fallen out of it. It worked a treat, the holes in the side didn't let in enough light to stop the stems shooting up. The rhubarb was lovely and tender and nice and long. The harvest yielded about 1.2kg. I left a few stems behind to give the plant a chance to recover. I won't take any more from this plant until next year.

Forcing rhubarb in an old incinerator behind a Nottingham cobnut (29 Apr 2012)

After a really cold spell the weather has been beautiful and warm this weekend. It's been the first chance to spend more than 10 minutes outside in the garden so far this year. I wasn't expecting to see too much growth after the cold weather but looking more closely I got a few nice surprises. In particular the various different alliums were growing nicely.

I have three rows of soft necked garlic in one of the raised beds and they are all about 10cm high now. I've kept the largest bulbs from last year's growth so hopefully they will be a decent size again this year. They probably kept us stocked up for about 6 months last year.

As well as the ones grown in the beds there are a few places where I've planted garlic around the forest garden and left them to grow as perennials. These have now formed clumps of varying size from just a few stems to 20-30. For the most part I've put these close to the base of the fruit trees. I haven't harvested any of the leaves, but think these could make a good substitute for spring onions at this time of year.

As well as the soft necked garlic I have some hard-necked rocambole planted around the Annie Elizabeth apple. It was slow to grow after planting, but I saw the scapes and bulbils rising up above the undergrowth last year. Now that the growth has died back the young shoots of all four plants are shooting up. I don't know whether there will be a single scape from each clump this year, or multiple ones. I planted some of the bulbils around the garden in autumn so hopefully I'll eventually have a supply of small bulbils to supplement the soft necked garlic.

Rocambole hard necked garlic (25 Feb 2012)

Last year I put in some wild garlic plants in a shady spot next to some rhubarb. They started to come up about a week ago and have grown very quickly. I don't think I will harvest any this year but plan to split them into two or three clumps once they have died back.

Wild garlic - Allium ursinum (25 Feb 2012)

A couple of years ago I planted some bulbils of Babington's leek (Allium babingtonii), a large allium that grows by the coast in South West England. It is supposed to grow to sizes of 1.0-1.5m. I didn't see any sign of them last year and had just about given up hope but several of them have now appeared where I planted them around the Court of Wick apple.

Babington's leek (25 Feb 2012)

They aren't full size yet, but they look like they could be harvested around now. Martin Crawford's book says they will probably regrow if cut off at the base - I might have to give it a try. They would definitely make a welcome harvest at this time of year.